Not a Lancer. The Lancer name was absent from Australia between 1982-1987. The Colt was never offered as a wagon in Australia, only as a sedan or hatch. I am not sure what this car is - it doesn't look like a model of car that was ever sold in Australia. I'm guessing then that this was brought over to Australia from the USA by the film makers. It's not just a random background vehicle because they went to the effort of changing the plate to an American one.

Mod: Not a Lancer. The Lancer name was absent from Australia between 1982-1987. The Colt was never offered as a wagon in Australia, only as a sedan or hatch. I am not sure what this car is - it doesn't look like a model of car that was ever sold in Australia. I'm guessing then that this was brought over to Australia from the USA by the film makers. It's not just a random background vehicle because they went to the effort of changing the plate to an American one.

It wasn't was brought over to Australia from the USA because it's not a US model either. It's just a 1985-88 Lancer wagon/estate/kombi/break (choose your country), and it looks identical to this euro-spec one :

It could only have been imported from the US, and not from some East Asian country?

Any car brought into Australia would have to be destroyed or shipped back. Cars from the US could be shipped back to America after filming ended (at a cost effective price because everything would go over in one shipment), but from South Asia? What would be the point... of shipping ONE car over from a random Asian country and then having to either destroy it afterwards, or ship it back?

I wasn't aware of there being such a destructive hatred towards imports in Australia. In fact, I thought it was entirely possible - but I probably had it confused with New Zealand. I was merely suggesting East Asia because that would be the most adjacent and most possible part of the world a car like this could have come from. I'm not saying it got there alone, I was thinking that there was a larger market for cheap second-hand imports in Australia, but apparantly there is no such thing.

If what you said is true (the part about imports getting destroyed or shipped back), what happened with this black cab after being auctioned off for $7K? Did it have to get shipped all the way back to the UK or was it set on fire?

I didn't say that all imports had to be destroyed. Some are allowed, but the rules are very strict. For instance, a vehicle that's brought into Australia just for the purposes of filming a movie, has to be destroyed. There's no way it can stay here. It's the same situation in the USA. There is no hatred towards them except from the manufacturers who want to protect their interests (and so they should). That black cab was probably a genuine personal import from someone who owned it in the UK for a period of time then brought it over here (as you are legally allowed to do).

It's possible, but extremely unlikely. In the mid-80s, import duty on cars brought into Australia was about 50%. As such, very few personal imports were brought in at the time, compared to today (even today, few are brought in). For example, importing a car worth $5,000 into Australia in 1985 would attract about $2,500 in import duty alone.

And aren't problems only for importing cars with wheels on the wrong side?
If the car is imported from UK, can't it be registered more easily?

All modern cars have to be converted to RHD; classic cars (over 30 years old) are exempt. But the location of the wheel has nothing to do with the regulations relating to importing the vehicle. i.e. importing a car from the UK is no easier than importing one from the US. The only difference is that the one from the US would need to be converted to RHD within 6 months of being imported.